Under Where?
by LanieSullivan
Summary: An alternate explanation of how Lee's boxers ended up in Amanda's laundry in A Matter of Choice with shades of Remembrance of Things Past. Rated T just for some slight innuendo. One-shot


Disclaimer: "Scarecrow and Mrs. King" is copyrighted to Warner Brothers and Shoot the Moon Productions. The plot is mine, but not the characters. This story is meant for enjoyment purposes only. No infringement is intended.

Author's Note: This story would not have to be if not for a delightful, albeit twisted chat with Janet about coming up with a non-smutty way to explain Lee's boxers being in Amanda's laundry in A Matter of Choice. So, Janet, thank you.

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

 **Under Where?**

Lee shrugged at Amanda's optimism over the potential for Jonathan and Francine to work out. "Well, you know what they say, everything comes out in the wash."

"Oh, speaking of the wash...something of yours came out in ours," She informed him as she tossed her dishtowel aside and turned toward the laundry basket on the counter.

"Oh, no, not another sock."

"No, not a sock," she answered as she tried to keep her tone light and even, before turning around and whipping his boxers out in front of him. Off his embarrassed groan, she flicked her tongue against her lips, gave him a salacious grin and teased, "I'd recognize 'em anywhere."

"I just bet you do," he fired back as he edged closer to her, setting his coffee cup on the counter behind her. He leaned in and took them from her hands with a shake of his head. "What I can't figure out is how they got here. I mean, a stray sock I can understand, but these...We've always been really careful"

"You don't remember?" She raised a questioning eyebrow and gave him a bit of a pout.

"No, I-I-I really don't. I mean, I know that I've been tired lately, but you and I get so little time together alone, I know that I haven't forgotten a single time with you."

"A single time of what?" she questioned obtusely.

He leaned in closer, pressing her body against the counter with his own and whispered, "You _know_ what." He then brushed his lips against the tender spot just below her ear while sliding his hands to her waist..

Trying not to be swayed by his attention even though he was sending shivers of delight up her spine, she went on with her teasing as she took the garment from his hand at her side. "Oh, I don't know...maybe these didn't get here the way you seem to think they did."

Lee pulled back to look at her in confusion. "If not that, then how the hell else would they have gotten here? Where'd you find them anyway?"

"Under the sofa," she answered with a nod to the den.

"The sofa? What the hell?" At seeing her smirk, he began to smell a rat, "Okay, now I know you're just messing with me. We've never...not down here where someone might walk in on us."

"You _still_ don't remember?" she chided him as she wriggled out of his grasp and headed for the den, leaning agasint the back of the sofa. When he caught up to her, she turned and gestured to the sofa cushions. "It was right here."

Lee was beginning to get perturbed, knowing that he didn't remember them ever making love on the sofa in her living room. "Are you _sure_ those are actually mine?"

She rolled her eyes at him. "Who else's would they be?"

"I don't know, your weatherman's?" he suggested, just a hint of jealousy in his tone.

"UGH!" she scoffed and waved the boxers in his face as if to slap him with them. "No! These are actually yours." When they simply stared at each other for a long moment, each trying to wear the other one down, she finally conceded and said, "Fine! Since you clearly don't remember, I'll tell you."

"Good." He nodded firmly.

"Do you remember when you were staying here after that crazy actor tried to kill you?"

"Do I? I've still got the shish-kebabbing scar to prove it," Lee grumbled. "What has that got to do with anything?"

"That's how they ended up under my sofa...Or more specifically under the rug under the sofa."

Lee scratched his head. "I don't get it."

"Well, first of all, sit down before you fall down," She guided him to the other side of the sofa and urged him to sit. "Okay, it was like this...Remember how we came home from that horrible drive-in Buzz Blade movie?"

"Most horrifying two hours of my life," Lee quipped.

"That's beside the point. When we got back from the movie and were sitting in here talking about it, you'd noticed that Mother and the boys' bags were sitting over there." She pointed the direction the bags had been sitting that night.

"Okay, I'm with you. Just one of the many times you hustled me out the door as if I had leprosy or something."

"Still missing the point," Amanda snapped in irritation. "What you didn't know is what happened afterward."

 _After tossing Lee's jacket that she'd hidden behind her back to keep from her mother's view, out the French doors, Amanda turned back to the sound of Dotty's voice asking if she was feeling all right and let out a tiny gasp as she saw what was peeking out from under the sofa cushion that she'd just vacated; a pair of pale blue boxer shorts. Thinking they shouldn't also be tossed outside, she hastily yanked them from their hiding spot and shoved them under the rug before making her way to the kitchen doorway to hover over her mother while she poured her bedtime drink to make sure that she wouldn't wander back toward the den._

 _"I'll clean it up," Amanda offered as she stood positioned to block her mother's path to the_ _den._

 _When her mother agreed, she let out a sigh of relief, but then made a face and was just about to return to the den to retrieve the boxers from their hiding place so she could give them back to their rightful owner when she was startled by the phone ringing. Answering it on the first ring before her mother could, she let out a sharper, "Hello?" than she'd intended. Then just when she thought the coast was clear and was handing off the phone to Lee, she was jolted again by her mother calling her name down the stairs; so jolted that she dropped the phone out the window._

 _After getting rid of her mother's concerns once more she turned back to the kitchen window and hissed, "I'm sorry," then turned to make her way back to the den just when Lee popped up._

 _"Amanda," He grumbled as he lobbed the phone back through the window where it landed in the sink._

 _"Oh my gosh! Look at you. You're soaking wet! You're gonna catch your death!" She opened a drawer and pulled out a handful of dishtowels then hurried to the back door and called his name. "Get in here." When Lee entered through the back door, she hurriedly tried to start drying him off._

 _"Here, let me!" he snapped as he snatched the towels from her and worked at doing it himself. He then stalked to the laundry room to retrieve his bag from where he'd stowed it. "If you need me, I'll be in the garage," he grumbled then stomped out the door._

 _Amanda let out a deep sigh and with a shake of her head, went to retrieve the phone from the sink and put it back in its rightful place, then got more towels to clean up the water he'd tracked in before finally cleaning up the remnants of her mother's drink-making._

"By the time, I'd done all that and with Russell Sinclair trying to blow me to Kingdom Come the next day, I completely forgot about your underwear being under the rug," she finished telling the tale as she held them up. "That is, until I decided to move the sofa the other day to have the rug cleaned and there they were."

Lee laughed uproariously. "How your mother never caught us all those times, I'll never know," He said with an amused twinkle in his eye. "You know, I had a knot the size of lemon...right here..." he indicated the back of his head, "...for a week after you dropped the phone on my head." He reached for her to pull her in to his lap, causing her to emit a little squeal as he did. "It was all worth it though." He then kissed her soundly.

Amanda wrapped her arms around his neck, one hand still holding the underwear as she gave in to his kiss, teasing his lips with her tongue. Lee clasped her tighter as their kiss deepened and became more heated, their time apart having created a fierce need to be close.

Dotty chose that moment to trot down the stairs and into the kitchen, seemingly oblivious to their passionate interlude, with a breezy, "I'm going to fix myself a night cap. Does anyone want anything?"

Lee and Amanda quickly pulled apart and Amanda, just as she had three years before, hastily stowed Lee's boxers under the sofa. "No, Mother, we have everything we need right here."

Lee snickered softly and whispered in her ear, "And that, My Love, is the reason that I knew we'd never made love in here."


End file.
